Jordan has prepared for all exceptional circumstances with capability and efficiency; through proactive plans to absorb shocks and emergency conditions resulting from crises and conflicts that cast their shadows on everyone, including the obstruction of navigation through international straits. This is what the region has witnessed for some time, what the safety of navigation through the Strait of Hormuz has been exposed to, and what is happening these days in terms of escalation in the Bab al-Mandab Strait.
It is true that any obstruction of supply chains through international waterways directly affects the rise in prices, especially the cost of the energy and food bill, if alternatives are sought that require longer time, and the associated delays and increases in shipping and insurance costs; because the route is longer than the usual paths.
Hence, the Jordanian national crisis management and response system has a long history of overcoming similar challenges and imbalances that affected supply and logistics chains due to multiple global crises, through policies based on a margin of flexibility in dealing with shocks and exceptional circumstances, and containing their negative effects.
In this regard, His Majesty King Abdullah II bin Al-Hussein directed the government and the competent authorities on the necessity of protecting energy and food security; through an approach based on strengthening stocks, the necessity of raising and sustaining the national readiness system, diversifying energy sources, and finding alternatives, while in parallel maintaining a safe and sufficient stock of grains and basic commodities, and developing inventory management and strengthening partnership with the private sector in storage and transport.
His Majesty closely follows all relevant government measures, based on the centrality of energy and food security in the Jordanian national security system; emphasizing the necessity of developing proactive plans that are essentially based on absorbing the shock by strengthening safety margins in food, energy, storage, and transport.
In this, the government's strategy is based on adaptation, absorbing the shock, and managing it by strengthening and ensuring strategic stocks, emphasizing the regularity of supply chains, keeping the Port of Aqaba operating at the highest efficiency, diversifying transport and supply routes, and not relying on the sea only and searching for other alternatives.
In parallel, the government has developed proactive strategies and measures to enhance readiness to avoid major repercussions on the national economy, or those affecting strategic stocks and their availability, and what may cause price increases or cases of exploitation and monopoly in such circumstances, by imposing strict measures to monitor markets and prices.
In summary, Jordan possesses a competent and distinguished crisis management model based on hedging plans and precautionary measures to contain shocks and neutralize the consequences and repercussions of crises as much as possible; by adopting the strengthening of strategic stocks and diversifying supply, provisioning, and land transport alternatives, in a way that limits the direct economic effects on the citizen.
